Facilities

The University of Miami Phillip and Patricia Frost School of Music is home to many acoustically beautiful concert and recital halls, rehearsal and practice rooms, state-of-the-art recording studios and labs, an expansive technology center, and an outstanding music library that serves both our students and the community year round. Students may reserve halls for their recitals, and we welcome rental inquiries from community organizations.

An outstanding performance venue, the 600-seat Maurice Gusman Concert Hall is used for a variety of events including recitals, concerts, recordings, and other related projects. The School’s largest ensembles perform there as well as many of the smaller ensembles.
Each year, over 100 concerts and events are presented in this hall; most events are free to the public. The Gusman Concert Hall is also used throughout the year for an array of special events including the Frost School’s annual Festival Miami, an acclaimed international celebration of music featuring guest artists, Frost School faculty and ensembles in symphonic concerts, chamber music presentations, jazz performances, master classes, and much more. Several hundred high school students gather in Gusman Concert Hall each year for Honor Band, Honor Orchestra, Honor Choir, and Musical Theatre Day, and for performances and master classes with related faculty.

The administrative offices of the Phillip and Patricia Frost School of Music are housed in Gusman Concert Hall. The Office of the Dean, Undergraduate Studies, Graduate Studies, and Music Admissions are all located on the ground floor. The Gusman Concert Hall is named in honor of the late Maurice Gusman, a beloved donor to the University of Miami.

The L. Austin Weeks Center for Recording and Performance

Located on Lake Osceola in the center of the Coral Gables campus, central to the Frost School of Music, the L. Austin Weeks Center for Recording and Performance houses the L. Austin Weeks Recording Studio and the Victor E. Clarke Recital Hall. The Weeks Center is named in honor of the late L. Austin Weeks, a generous donor to the University of Miami.
The Weeks Recording Studio, one of the best academic recording studios in the world, is the home of the Music Engineering program. Recording sessions, recital recordings, and many practical laboratories are held there. Students participate fully in the maintenance, modification, installation, and design of all systems. Hands-on laboratories provide students with practical experience in recording studio technique. The Weeks Studio’s sound chamber features a 20-foot ceiling, two isolation rooms, assignable microphone panels, audio/video playback, and a Steinway grand piano. The audio equipment in the studio was installed by enrolled students working under faculty supervision; this included installation of components, console wiring, fiber optic network, as well as general maintenance and improvement.

The Victor E. Clarke Recital Hall is located within the L. Austin Weeks Center for Recording and Performance. This 147-seat recital hall is used daily for recitals, concerts, and ensemble performances. It was specifically designed to provide an intimate performance setting. Its acoustics are variable so that a wide range of music can be performed with optimal listening and recording conditions. Each year, many recitals and concerts are presented in this hall.

The Clarke Recital Hall was designed by noted acoustician Charles Boner, and is equipped with heavy draperies that can be opened and closed to provide optimal acoustics for a variety of musical styles. This recital hall is provided with a small adjacent recording studio and also interfaces with the larger Weeks Recording Studio. In addition, a RealAudio server computer is used to stream live concerts from this hall on the Frost School of Music web site.

The Marta and Austin Weeks Music Library and Technology Center

The Marta and Austin Weeks Music Library and Technology Center, the newest and largest branch of the University of Miami Libraries, showcases a wide range of resources. Among the nationally known collections housed in the 22,500 square-foot Weeks Music Library are sound recordings, musical theater archives, musical scores, musical manuscripts, research collections, and a wealth of e-resources. This state-of-the-art research facility, built at a cost of $9.9 million, offers an exceptional environment conducive to learning, with 161 total seats at study tables, group and individual listening stations, and computer workstations.

The 5,200 square-foot Music Technology Center houses a Music Engineering Lab, two Keyboard/Computer Labs, a Multimedia Instruction and Learning Lab (MILL), an Electronic Music Lab, and a Media-Writing and Production Lab. All of the labs contain computers with flat-panel displays, sophisticated software packages for program-specific work, 5.1 Surround Sound™ monitoring, audio/video playback systems, and video projection capabilities.

Recording Studios

In addition, the Frost School of Music maintains fully professional, state-of-the-art recording studios. Maurice Gusman Concert Hall houses a renovated studio dedicated to media research and the production of new multimedia titles. This facility integrates computer-based audio/video production systems such as video rendering software, video editing software, audio recording and editing software, and digital synthesis instruments used to create sophisticated DVD titles, computer games, and other new media content.

The control room and studio in the L Austin Weeks Recording Studio was designed and constructed specifically to accommodate the most complex music recording projects. A media technologist’s dream, this facility offers a Euphonix System 5 automated digital mixing console, ProTools hard disk recorders, distributed video displays, networked computers, media workstations, and computer-driven analysis and test equipment. Using the superb isolation and acoustics in this digital multitrack studio, students can perform and produce world-class recordings.

Keyboard/MIDI Labs

The Frost School of Music has two computer/ MIDI Keyboard labs, equipped with digital pianos and a group lesson controller that enables professors to simultaneously monitor and instruct students. In addition, the Keyboard/MIDI lab in the Arnold Volpe Building contains hardware and software for personal productivity, MIDI sequencing (recording), musical notation, and educational software for learning to play piano, ear training, music theory, and music appreciation. Each computer is networked to the Frost School of Music local area network (LAN) that allows authorized users to access all of the software, to share files with any other computer on the LAN, or by accessing the University LAN, to share files with any other networked machine on campus or anywhere in the world via the Internet and the World Wide Web.

Bertha Foster Memorial Music Building

The Bertha Foster Memorial Music Building contains practice rooms and teaching studios, a pipe organ studio, an electronic music laboratory, a studio equipped for audio recording, and two large rehearsal rooms, one of which is equipped as a recording studio.

Rehearsal Center

The Rehearsal Center contains three rehearsal halls – Henry Fillmore Band Hall, Nancy Greene Hall, and Broby Hall – as well as most woodwind and brass studios.

For complete details, contact the Frost School of Music Operations Office at 305-284-2438, or email William Dillon, Director, Music Operations, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).